The emergence of new media and platforms has compelled media literacy scholars to review their theoretical frameworks and methodological approaches. Based on a new conception –‘transmedia literacy’– ...that moves from traditional media literacy (teaching critical media skills at school) to informal learning and participatory cultures, the research behind the present article aims to understand how new generations are doing things with media and how they learn to do the things they do. The outputs of this international research that involved 8 countries were organised into three sections: 1) transmedia skills, 2) informal learning strategies and 3) emergent issues regarding teens, new media and collaborative cultures. Finally, the article deals with the future perspectives of transmedia literacy as a research and action programme.
In this paper we draw on the findings on teens' transmedia practices from the research project Transmedia Literacy carried out in eight countries from Europe, Latin America and Australia between 2015 ...and 2018. An ethnographic approach that combined different research methods, including questionnaires, participatory-creative workshops, interviews, media diaries and online community observation, was used to explore what teens are doing with media. In this article we focus on how teens perform their digital identity on Instagram. This social network is notably popular among young people, and the practice of taking, editing, selecting, hiding and sharing photos and videos through it is part of teenagers' everyday lives and online interactions. We argue that this curating process encompasses several aspects that are central to teenagers creating a digital persona on Instagram, including content creation, validation through 'likes' and 'followers' and socio-technical automation. This curation can lead in certain profiles to a professionalized use of the platform, so that the self becomes an object of marketing and promotion for career and business purposes.
This article presents the results of the Spanish context of a study carried out with adolescents within the Transmedia Literacy project (European Union). The aim of the article is to identify the ...transmedia skills that teenagers have and the informal learning strategies carried out to acquire them. The results show that teenagers have different transmedia skills, but they have them to very varying degrees. Their acquisition of these skills is conditioned by their motivations, attitudes and their context. YouTube is a key source of information and learning of transmedia skills among the Spanish adolescents of the study. The study findings show that young people rely mostly on 'imitation' and 'learning by teaching' strategies to learn new skills. Based on these results the myth of the digital native is deconstructed and the concept of 'digital apprentice' is considered.
Se analiza la brecha digital de género entre adolescentes de siete países de Europa, en Australia y países de Sudamérica a través de una perspectiva socio-cultural, comparando qué hábitos de uso y ...consumo son atribuidos y desempeñados por adolescentes en los múltiples medios y redes sociales y si ellos se enmarcan en roles estereotipados de género. Los datos se extraen del proyecto de investigación Transmedia literacy (2015-2018), que tenía cómo objetivos principales explorar qué están haciendo los adolescentes con los medios y cómo aprendieron a hacerlo. Para ello, se realizó un acercamiento etnográfico utilizando varios métodos de investigación como cuestionarios, entrevistas y observación participante, entre otros. En ese artículo nos centramos en el análisis del cuestionario implementado para mapear los hábitos de uso y consumo mediático de los adolescentes (N=1.520). Para responder a los objetivos del artículo se ha llevado a cabo un análisis descriptivo univariante y bivariante. Los resultados demuestran que la brecha digital de género sigue existiendo y que toma forma a través de la pervivencia de estereotipos de género y de roles asociados a los hombres y mujeres y su relación con las tecnologías y medios de comunicación, como es el caso de los videojuegos (asociados a los chicos) y de la creación de relatos (asociado a las chicas).
This article is part of the outcomes of the Transmedia Literacy research project on teens and transmedia collaborative practices carried out in eight countries between 2015 and 2018. A multi-method ...approach was used in the study (questionnaires, workshops, media diaries, interviews, observation of online communities) to explore what teens are doing with media. This article presents a map of the uses and practices teens make of YouTube. The metaphors of YouTube that emerged when teens put these uses and practices into discourse are also identified. Five YouTube uses were detected: radiophonic, televisual, social, productive and educative. These uses vary according to the practices performed by teens and how they are related to the logics of the YouTube platform. Moreover, the identified metaphors show the ways teens' uses are related to their everyday routines and the way they integrate the YouTube platform into various dimensions of their social life, such as their media practices, and the way they acquire knowledge and skills.
Resumen El propósito del artículo es identificar y analizar los modelos aspiracionales y de atracción de los adolescentes presentados en las teen series españolas e indicados como favoritos por este ...target. Para ello, se combinan dos estudios: uno de audiencias realizado con 787 estudiantes de Barcelona y centrado en el análisis de las diferencias de género a la hora de escoger y valorar personajes adolescentes, y uno de contenido cualitativo, centrado en el estudio de los personajes indicados como preferidos por los adolescentes encuestados en la primera fase. Los resultados muestran que los adolescentes entrevistados tienden a elegir y valorar los personajes masculinos y femeninos de las teen series en función del género: en primer lugar, tanto chicos como chicas mayoritariamente escogen a personajes masculinos como sus favoritos; en segundo lugar, los personajes masculinos son más escogidos por ser “rebeldes”, “divertidos” y “malotes con buen fondo”, mientras que los femeninos son más escogidos por ser “buenas personas” y “valientes y decididas”. El análisis cualititativo de los personajes confirma que los masculinos son chicos rebeldes y malotes con buen fondo, mientras que los femeninos son chicas responsables y atractivas. Las teen series españolas construyen, de esta manera, una esfera femenina, vinculada a la responsabilidad y sensibilidad, y otra masculina, rebelde y viril. Por supuesto, observamos también excepciones, personajes más complejos y ricos en matices, aunque son minoritarias. Estos resultados nos alerta de la necesidad de representar personajes más plurales y complejos que se alejen de los clásicos estereotipos que acaban perpetuando diferencias de género.
Recent anti‐LGBTQ+ discourse has increased the threat of violence against people who do not follow the cisheteronormative mandates. To face these dialectics, the media can offer alternative ...discourses, in particular by providing realistic and non‐stereotyped LGBTQ+ representations. Media portrayals can be seen as both positive and negative. On one hand, they may offer stereotypical and narrow representations, but on the other, they can include representations that can become aspirational models and improve visibility. The objective of this article is to explore this second perspective by analyzing the representation of Jules, a trans female character from the American series Euphoria (Levinson et al., 2019–present). To this end, we conducted a close reading analysis (Castelló, 2008) of the first season of the series. The results show three axes of representation that move away from the traditional portrayal of trans characters: (a) a narrative that moves beyond the “trans fact” and presents complex and plural stories, (b) a representation of the trans individual as an element of value and love, away from fetishism, and (c) a link between the trans realm and specific spaces of comfort and freedom.
Based on the qualitative analysis of data from workshops and interviews with teenagers from eight countries, this article aims to determine the degrees of productive, narrative, and aesthetic ...knowledge that teenagers put into practice when they create their media contents. From a theoretical framework that links teens, informal learning environments, and participatory cultures, the findings point toward three types of teenage produsers: casual, aspirational, and expert. Each type is representative of different aspects of production in terms of the types of media contents produced; the planning of the production process; the application of narrative and aesthetic values when creating; and the motivations behind the production. The study concludes with an invitation to rethink what participatory culture means in the light of teenagers’ production practices.
Son pocos los estudios en la línea de investigación de los hábitos de consumo mediático de los adolescentes y jóvenes centrados en las diferencias de género en España. Este estudio se propone ...trabajar en esta línea mediante un estudio cuantitativo. De la administración de 787 cuestionarios a adolescentes de Barcelona (España) se desprenden resultados reveladores: los adolescentes hacen consumos estereotipados por género. Las chicas consumen más productos dramáticos centrados en las relaciones interpersonales y los chicos, más humor y videojuegos. Además, las chicas se ven sometidas a más controles familiares que los chicos en sus consumos mediáticos.
The emergence of new media, devices, narratives and practices has compelled media literacy scholars and professionals to review their theoretical frameworks and methodological approaches. Based on a ...new conception – ‘transmedia literacy’ – that moves from traditional media literacy to informal learning and participatory cultures practices, the research program behind the present article tries to understand how new generations are doing things with media outside schools and how they learnt to do the things they do. The article begins by describing the transformations of media literacy in recent years as a consequence of the mutations of the media ecology and, in that context, proposes a methodological approachfor analysing the acquisition of transmedia skills in informal learning environments by teens. The article describes, analyses and evaluates the development and initial implementation of this methodology working with teenagers in a high-school in NAME CITY. It ends with a Research Kit that includes surveys, creative workshops, interactive interviews and media diaries with teens between 12-18 years old. The article also describes the evolution of this methodological approach from its original formulation to the evaluation of the model after it was tested, and reflects on the possibilities of developing specific research devices to be applied in transnational research.
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